Dear Fear and Anxiety: Your Whispers Are Opinions, Not Facts

I often wonder if you have always been as controlling as you have become over the past 18 months. I often wonder if your grip has always been as tight as it has become over the past 18 months. I often wonder if you are the fast heart rate. I often wonder if you are the stabbing pain in my chest. I often wonder if you are the burning sensation on my skin. I often wonder if you are the stabbing pain in my head. I often wonder if you are the pressure on my chest. I often wonder if you are the numb feeling in my arm. I often wonder if you are the life limiting thoughts in my head.

While I wonder about you, I have lost the ability to wander and meander! You have transformed my life into short and straight lines. You are forever whispering and eroding at the person that I am. Eroding away at me with wave after wave of “what ifs.” Whispering and reminding me about when you were my savior, if we should ever disagree. I am truly grateful for the times when you have been my guiding light and the enabler of my sensible decisions. However, I feel that the time has arrived for you to take a back seat because I am no longer prepared to pay the price you seek.

It is time that I take control and lead.

Your whispers are no longer facts, but opinions, which I shall decide if I should heed to or simply ignore, as is my right. You protest your innocence and say we are lifelong companions. You whisper, “We are one and the same, don’t you see?”

Yes, yes I see, but not as you see. I see your smile, but I also see the menace in your eyes.

You will no longer bully me by transporting me into the past or the future because I finally understand that life must be lived in the present. You say that it is impossible for me to change and take back control. I say I would rather take advice from the great Mohammed Ali. He said, “Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they’ve been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It’s an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It’s a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing.”

Today I have decided that I am not a small man and I shall explore the power within me. So my friends fear and anxiety, from this day forth I accept your dares and challenges. Come my friends, let’s go and rediscover life all over again. Let us accept each other and wander and meander together.